Journal
OPTICS EXPRESS
Volume 19, Issue 25, Pages 25134-U1043Publisher
OPTICAL SOC AMER
DOI: 10.1364/OE.19.025134
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Funding
- International Institute for Complex Adaptive Matter (ICAM-I2CAM)
- University of Colorado
- NSF [DMR 0645461, DMR-0820579, DMR-0847782]
- National Basic Research program of China [2004CB719800]
- Australian Research Council
- Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien [844115] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien
- Division Of Materials Research [0820579] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Division Of Materials Research [844115] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Division Of Materials Research
- Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien [0847782] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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We describe a simple microrheology method to measure the viscosity coefficients of lyotropic liquid crystals. This approach is based on the use of a rotating laser-trapped optically anisotropic microsphere. In aligned liquid crystals that have negligible effect on trapping beam's polarization, the optical torque is transferred from circularly polarized laser trapping beam to the optically anisotropic microparticle and creates the shear flow in the liquid crystalline fluid. The balance of optical and viscous torques yields the local effective viscosity coefficients of the studied lyotropic systems in cholesteric and lamellar phases. This simple yet powerful method is capable of probing viscosity of complex anisotropic fluids for small amounts of sample and even in the presence of defects that obstruct the use of conventional rheology techniques. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America
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